


Playing Hopscotch Blindfolded

by viciouswishes



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-04
Updated: 2008-09-04
Packaged: 2018-03-05 06:42:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,420
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3109910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viciouswishes/pseuds/viciouswishes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Off-world missions are like playing hopscotch blindfolded.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Playing Hopscotch Blindfolded

**Author's Note:**

  * For [havocthecat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/havocthecat/gifts).



> Beta: Jason  
> Prompt: First time off-world together.

Elizabeth doesn't expect much from her first off-world mission since coming to Atlantis. The others have been to their alpha site a dozen or more times. Her visit is simply protocol, like a respected dignitary here to crack open a bottle of champagne.

Of course, there is no champagne in the Pegasus Galaxy. But Teyla has brought some of her people's mulled wine. Sheppard has already warned Elizabeth of its potency.

She drinks too much anyway. It's unprofessional and unbecoming. Granted, her too much has always been everyone else's just barely.

"I am glad you were able to come with us, Dr. Weir," Teyla says. Her cup's full in her hand.

"Me too." Elizabeth rolls her shoulders, relaxing. "It's nice to have my feet on the ground. Sometimes I envy you and the rest of the team and your ability to get away from the City. Until you're shot at anyway."

Teyla nods knowingly. "It is not the most pleasant part of our duty. I suppose that there are times when the team could use another diplomat." They both know that sometimes Teyla has to spend extra time soothing roughened up feelings.

"I'm also a verily adaptive linguist," Elizabeth says.

"Did you study languages in your universities?"

"No." Elizabeth shakes her head. "I always picked them up quickly, especially as a child. My father worked with the United Nations, a sort of world peace keeping group, and we were always traveling. I guess it's become second nature to figure out how to ask a group of children if they would like to join me in a game of hopscotch."

"What is 'hopscotch'?" Teyla asks. The other woman has adapted so well to their Atlantean lifestyle that Elizabeth sometimes forgets about things Teyla would have no reference to. But something makes her smile in that Teyla cares to ask, unlike Sheppard and McKay's battles over Star Wars and Star Trek.

"It's a child's game where boxes with numbers are drawn on the ground and you hop: sometimes on one foot and sometimes on both." Elizabeth sits down under the boughs of a tall tree. It reminds of her the large oak in her grandfather's backyard. She motions for Teyla to join her. "I think I'm beginning to like this galaxy."

"It is not all bad," Teyla says, settling down next to Elizabeth, "you just have to know where to look."

A captain, she believes his name is Reyes, hands both of them a fresh cup of wine. Elizabeth smiles at him. She'll have to find a discrete way to dump some of it from her glass. Perhaps when she needs a bathroom break. "Do your people have similar children's games?"

Teyla laughs as if she's reliving some delightful childhood memories. "Many. One of my favorites as a child was a dare game to cross a rope bridge, blindfolded and led by a friend. The bridge was never going to fall down as some of the children's taunts claimed. However, it was still a game we would not play around adults."

"I can imagine."

*****

Elizabeth takes Teyla's hand to her bed that night. It's foolish. She's sure a guard or two saw them enter her tent together and neither come out until morning. But Teyla's beautiful and the night seems too gorgeous to waste.

Teyla's incredibly soft. Even her finger tips, which Elizabeth finds surprising considering their line of work and Teyla's job. They're wrapped around each other, a little warm and little dazed in a post-coital bliss. "That was..." Teyla starts to say. She tips her head and places a kiss above Elizabeth's right breast. "Wonderful," she finishes.

Elizabeth sinks even further into the blow-up mattress when Teyla runs her hands through Elizabeth's hair. "Best camping trip ever. Even if they did just do it for sport."

"Given your spirits, I would say the wine has not worn off."

"Don't say that." Elizabeth gives Teyla's ass a light tap. Her hand receives a happy wiggle. "I'm enjoying my roughing it vacation."

Teyla rolls her eyes. Elizabeth wonders if eye rolling is universal or too much time around McKay and Ford. "I only meant that you did not have a hangover. Yet. And I should mention that this is not roughing it. Rodney has more generators than we have toes on this world and I think I am going to order many of these air mattresses from your world should we make contact with them."

"When we make contact again," Elizabeth must always keep hoping they'll reach Earth again, "I'll personally accompany you on a shopping trip to Camping World, a huge store."

"Do they have two-person sleeping bags? Because I think I would like to share one with you."

"Now who's had too much wine."

*****

"Take my hand," Teyla shouts over the gun fire.

Elizabeth does and she runs. She runs faster than the time she beat Jimmie Thompson on the track senior year of high school. That was only for pride and this is for her life.

She'd convinced Sheppard to let her come on this mission: to a unknown world, her second time away from Atlantis, as an extra diplomat and linguist. And like many other Atlantis missions, this one had quickly soured, even with Elizabeth's help and expertise.

Teyla hides them behind a rock and takes position to provide cover fire for Sheppard, McKay, and Ford. She aims her gun at the kneecaps of their assailants with surefire confidence.

Elizabeth finds herself caught off-guard. She waits impatiently for the rest of team. Every second expanding too far; it's too much. She focuses on a pebble on the ground near her shoes. It shines in the warm summer-like heat.

She hears Sheppard's voice, barking orders and making plans to run to the gate. This is military; this is his expertise. She nods her head with her okay at everything he says.

Teyla leans forward, so close Elizabeth can smell her. So close, she thinks of a kiss for good luck. Teyla knows her well enough to sense with Elizabeth is not in her element. "Trust me. I will lead you back home," she whispers.

Sheppard signals and the shooting starts again.

*****

Elizabeth lets the grime wash off her body. She can still taste the residual gun powder. Patting her hair dry, she looks into the mirror, clean, but not well-rested and running on adrenaline. They'll all make their official reports tomorrow.

Bypassing a clean uniform, Elizabeth dresses in her white cotton shirt and dark jeans. She's prepared to fix herself a cup of tea and perhaps settle in with one of those billion ground-breaking papers her crew seems to author every week.

Instead, her door chimes and Teyla appears. "I hope I am not intruding," she says.

"You're always welcome here." Elizabeth steps towards Teyla and pulls her into kiss. This is what she's wanted to do since they stepped back on familiar territory.

"I want more of this," Teyla says, "But..." Her hand falls away from where it rested against Elizabeth's cheek.

"There's always a but." Elizabeth moves toward where she left her clean tea cups. She inquires if Teyla would like a cup, and at Teyla's nod, she grabs two cups.

"I was planning on taking a few days off to visit my people on the mainland."

Elizabeth remembers seeing note of this in the base-wide schedule. "Yes, it's been scheduled and approved." Not that Teyla needs approval to visit her own people, just use of a pilot and jumper.

"I did not come here to speak to Dr. Weir, but to speak with Elizabeth." Teyla is sharp, sharper than even Elizabeth on keeping their working life separate from their personal life. Elizabeth has never been one to leave work there, especially considering her quarters are 67 steps and one transporter away from the control room.

"Sorry." Elizabeth touches her hand to her forehead in dismissal of her earlier comment. "Habit. A bad one. Elizabeth's all ears."

"I was hoping that you might accompany me. And perhaps teach a few Athosian children how to play hopscotch. Ford mentioned the game is played with chalk and he found some for me." Teyla produced to lumpy white rocks. "Or what Dr. Meres went on a long rant was similar to chalk."

Elizabeth thinks that this is perhaps exactly what she needs. She can't thank Teyla enough. "I think the soil might be more adapt to drawing with sticks. But we can try on the rocks near the river first."


End file.
